Glamour and Candelabra
by dottsie
Summary: Cleo and Seth have a conversation on a balcony during an important Egyptian party. It turns out they're more on the same page than Cleo originally thought. / Set pre-Boo York, in a universe where they knew about the engagement before the trip instead of finding out on the night of the comet.


**hey that new scario bros game is out and it's multiplayer, wanna go out tomorrow and get it**

 **Can't visit tomorrow. We've got a mummy meeting that night and we're flying out to Boo York City tonight for it.**

 **mummy meeting? sounds serious**

 **Very. Relatively, there's not a lot of mummies in the world. The oldies have created a club and we all meet every so often, usually every few years. This has been the first time we've had one since before I started high school.**

 **hope it all goes well!**

 **The best possible outcome would be getting bored out of my mind, so we'll see.**

 **aw i thought you liked all that fancy stuff**

 **I do, but this isn't the fun kind of fancy stuff, this is a bunch of boring adults.**

 **if you get sad just think about how fun this game will be when we get to play it and i am 10x better than you at it and leave you in the dust**

 **Comforting, but you've got the wrong idea. I'm picking Princess Screech and you're going to eat your words. :***

* * *

Cleo closed out her text conversation with Deuce. It was from the previous day, but she had nothing else to do but read it, and she thought seeing things he said might make her feel a bit more grounded, even though he refused to use capitalization.

Just as Cleo had predicted, the meeting was, so far, a snorefest.

The initial mingling was over now; that was always the worst part. She couldn't just blend into the background at her father's side, she had to socialize or else she was behaving rudely. So much had changed since the last meeting.

Conversation with the others wasn't really difficult, it was just uninteresting. All the other mummies were either adults or too young, for the most part, save for her sister and Seth Ptolemy, and she wanted nothing to do with either of them. And everyone else who had been a teenager when she was a child was now an adult.

She wasn't sure whether to count their leader Tut as a kid or not; he looked like a preteen, but that was only due to a mishap with the Fountain of Youth shortly after he was untombed a few centuries back, or so Cleo had heard. Despite his appearance, he had been in the modern world longer than all of them, and was probably more calculated, too. So he probably didn't count, even though he had maintained the childish personality that matched his appearance.

None of adults ever wanted to talk about anything engaging. It was always business, and how each family was faring in the towns they lived in. Most mummy familes had significant influence in their cities; her own father was involved in New Salem's city board, overseeing construction. Cleo guessed they thought this was the first step in rebuilding their empires from scratch.

Now, sitting at one of the long dinner tables after the first course had been served, she considered how ironic it was that they were stuck in their ancient mindsets, but never talked about ancient Egypt itself.

 _That_ was something she was interested in hearing about. Her own memories were fuzzy at worst and short at best, due to spending only the first seven years of her life there.

The fish tasted good, but she couldn't focus on it. She couldn't help thinking about what Mrs. Ptolemy had said when she ran into her earlier that night. The older mummy had a pleased look on her face, and she mentioned something about a surprise that would be announced at dinner. Surprises with people like that were never good.

About ten minutes into dinner, after everyone had gotten settled, Cleo noticed Mrs. Ptolemy standing up, obviously preparing to speak. A feeling of vague dread entered her stomach, but she pushed it down. It was probably nothing, and she was only worried because she was so bored and needed something to occupy her brain.

Mrs Ptolemy rapped her gold-lined wine glass with her fork. "Pardon me, everyone, may I have your attention?"

It didn't take long at all for the quiet murmur of conversation to come to a halt. Mrs. Ptolemy smiled calmly. "First, I would like to say it's an honor to meet with you all again, and it is an even bigger honor that Ptolemy Tower has been chosen as the gathering place for tonight's conclave."

A couple that had been mummified when they were middle-aged nodded their heads respectfully, and Cleo felt a pang of slight guilt that she couldn't remember their names.

"I shall get straight to the point so that we can eat. Ramses de Nile, as you all know, is the most recent addition to the circle, but he has already made a name for himself in New Salem, Massaboosetts, and I'm confident that his skill will only serve to strengthen his success, in the same vein as my family."

Out of the corner of her eye, Cleo saw her father smiling, which was never a good sign. Not for her, anyway. Where exactly was this going?

"For this reason, we're pleased to announced that, after coming to an agreement, our children, Seth and Cleo, are to be married."

Cleo nearly dropped her fork as her heart fell into her stomach. Had she heard correctly?

Mrs. Ptolemy continued, "This union shall strengthen the circle's power, I'm sure. The de Niles and the Ptolemys will stand as one, and our legacies will continue on, on the night the great comet arrives..."

She kept talking, but Cleo couldn't hear. Her hands were trembling. Married? What was this, thirteen hundred B.C.?

Cleo looked over at Seth, who was sitting across and to the right of her. His mask's expression was completely vacant, making it impossible to see how he truly felt. Did he know about this beforehand? He probably did and he just didn't tell her, the momma's boy.

She cleared her throat loudly, interrupting Mrs. Ptolemy. The older mummy folded her hands in front of her, her eyes not narrowing, but threatening to. "Yes, Cleo?"

"You know, this is the first I'm hearing of this. Like, at all."

"I understand your concerns, but Ramses and I have discussed this at length, and we're confident that-"

Cleo's voice got more forceful. She had never done this at a meeting before, but she felt like her blood would be boiling now if she had any. "That what? That you don't need to get my say in it at all?"

Seth finally spoke up, his voice more hesitant. "You know, I didn't hear about this until just now, either."

"Calm down. This will help both of our families. It's a great honor," Ramses stated.

"I have a _boyfriend_ , dad! For almost three years now!" She pushed her heavy chair back and it groaned loudly as it scraped the floor. "Did you possibly forget that little detail?"

"You already know how I feel about that boy, Cleo." His voice took on a cold tone, most likely as a warning. "This has already been decided, now hold your tongue, you're causing a scene."

Nefera was smiling, obviously holding back laughter. For once in her life, though, she didn't have a comment. If they weren't around the other mummies, she might have.

Cleo grit her teeth. "... You know what? I'll be right back, father. Excuse me, everyone."

She stood up, her gold bracelets jingling as she headed for the door to the hallway. The jackal guards on either side of the double doors opened them for her. She ignored the disapproving murmurs from the other mummies and the demands from Ramses for her to stop.

As the doors shut behind her, Cleo didn't look back to see the circle's expressions. She knew she had just embarrassed her family, and probably Seth's family, too. But she didn't find herself concerned about it. She felt an entire life's worth of anger and frustration pounding in her chest, and it clawed its way up to her eyes as she began tearing up.

She was on autopilot, not really paying attention to where she was going. Her feet ended up bringing her to one of the tower's balconies that overlooked the city. It was silent up here, except for the sound of the wind and the city below.

It was completely vacant, since the building had been cleared out for the night. Therefore, nobody was around when Cleo started sobbing.

How dare they? She wasn't a pawn. Neither was Seth, as much as he bored her, and as much as he kissed up to his mother.

A couple years ago, she may have stayed quiet for the rest of the dinner, continuing to eat even though she would have felt sick, and saved the crying for the bathroom later. She was a lot more compliant then; she had to be. At least, she felt that she had to be.

But her senior year of high school was just starting; a lot had changed since that one Halloween a few years back. She wasn't going to make the mistake of giving into the pressure her father put on her about something that huge again, not if she could help it.

What could she do, though? Her father and Mrs. Ptolemy may be able to sign marriage papers behind her back. She wasn't sure if they'd be able to do that, since she was under the impression both members of the marriage had to sign the documents, but royalty had their ways. She thought to herself that trying to argue with her father may have made the situation worse.

This made her feel dizzy, and not in a good way.

The lights of the buildings and cars were all fuzzy blurs, like her tears were an Instagrim filter. She heard the door that she had come through open, and she didn't re-position herself. She waited for the intruder to speak, not acknowledging their presence at all.

"Hello there." Oh, Ra, it was Seth.

Cleo's shoulders shuddered and she wiped her tears away, taking care not to smudge her mascara or to poke her eye with her nail. Her voice was low. "Go back in there, I'm fine."

After he approached her, Seth placed an awkward hand on her shoulder and he felt her shoulders tense, and then relax. "Doesn't look like it."

"Will you please just give me a minute?"

"Mother would say something about how it's best not to bring personal feelings into the court, but she can't be right all the time."

Cleo glared at him and her lip curled. "What happened to momma's boy back there?"

Seth frowned. "What happened to the quiet, subservient daughter we always see at meetings?"

"Go to hell."

"You're not happy with the situation. What makes you think I am, either?"

"I've never seen you do anything but write poems. I didn't think you cared that much, as long as it helped the illusion of the dynasty our families have in their heads."

"I should let you read some of my poetry sometime. There's the ones I let my mother and the rest of the circle read, yeah, but I've got a hidden book in my room. If I didn't, I think I'd scream every time I was around her."

"Didn't take you for the rebellious type." Cleo sighed, her expression finally becoming less sharp, but her tears still lingering in her eyes.

Seth took his mask off and set it quietly on the table between the balcony's chairs. Cleo noticed that his face would have looked calm to an outsider, but she knew what a royal concealing their unhappiness looked like when she saw it. It was scary how good they were at that when they wanted to be.

The lights of Boo York City glittered on the streets below and down the line of buildings leading away from Ptolemy Tower. To Seth, it looked like a place that was familiar, forbidden, and a comfort all at once. To Cleo, it just looked like the glittering gold disguise that the mummies wore to distract people from the fact that they refused to change.

Cleo normally liked glittering gold things, but not if they were associated with her family.

She opted to stare at the ground instead; there were flecks of gold in the floor tiles. It was everywhere. "Don't take this the wrong way, Seth, but if they made us get married I would want to gouge my eyes out."

"I know the feeling. You're not exactly my type, anyway." He laughed uneasily as he stared at a passing plane. "Besides, you said you've already had a boyfriend for a while, right? Nefera mentioned him once before, so I know he's not recent."

"Yes." There was no telling what Nefera had said about Deuce, but she pushed the thought out of her head.

"Why don't you bring him up here sometime and introduce him to everyone? It could get them used to the idea."

Cleo shook her head. "Not a chance."

"Well, why not? You care about him, right?"

"Of course I do. That's exactly why I can't bring him here. I've thought about it before, but I know that I can't. Not after tonight, anyway." She sighed. "He's beyond good to me, but he isn't very refined. Most of the circle would hate him because you know how they are, and it would just make him feel bad. It would make him feel like he isn't good enough for me. I know how his mind works and I don't want to make him think that, because he is. There's not a person on this planet that's better for me."

Seth propped his chin up with a fist. "What do you see in him? Not a mean question, I just wanna hear about him."

Cleo smiled faintly at nothing. "He's the sweetest monster I've ever met, and he cooks, Seth, he cooks for me all the time. He even convinced me to play video games with him once. Not to mention he's one of the only people I know who has never once acted like my feelings don't matter."

"He sounds great. You know, I haven't met anyone like that yet."

"Well, I hope you do."

"You know that's the nicest thing you've said to me in your entire unlife?"

Cleo rolled her eyes. "We're going to need to make it clear that we aren't getting married. It's not thirteen hundred B.C. anymore, and we aren't in our old kingdom, either. They can't just treat this like it's purely an economic decision."

"Agreed. Those days are over." Seth began fiddling with his suit sleeves, the gold accents gleaming in the low light. "Why do you think it's so hard for the others to accept that the world works differently now?"

"Well, lots of them spent their entire adult lives in Egypt."

"Yeah, but some of them have been out-of-tomb for at least a few decades now. They really must have disconnected themselves from society, outside of business deals. Still stuck in Egypt."

Cleo's voice lowered to almost a whisper. "I barely remember Egypt. I was only seven years old when we were trapped. The only thing I can remember clearly was my mother, how she looked and how she talked, and things she did for me and Nefera."

"I fortunately had the luxury of being just a baby when I was mummified. I can't even remember a time when I didn't live in this world. It's all I've ever known."

"Everything that I can remember is hazy, like it was a dream. I wouldn't even be here if my uncle hadn't betrayed my father. " She sounded gravely serious.

"Hey, don't sell the gods short, or your family for that matter." He stood up. "You guys could have been mummified later. It wasn't uncommon practice to enchant the wraps beforehand so Osiris could reanimate us; I mean, look at all the mummies here tonight."

The princess stayed seated. "Perhaps, but I could have been quite a bit older when it happened. There's a chance I wouldn't have woken up in this world at the same time, and I wouldn't have aged the same, and I wouldn't have met all of my friends because they would have been several grades below me. Who knows how Osiris decides when we wake up, though?"

"Well, now's not the time for undue speculation, or for questioning the god of the afterlife's methods, either. We've got a meeting to get back to."

Cleo sighed. "They'll crucify us."

Seth was frowning again when he put his mask back on. His voice was made tinny by the solid gold. "If we stay away much longer, they'll come looking for us. We're in trouble either way."

"You're right, but I'm not happy about it. I'd rather be in denial a bit longer."

"Hey, let's just leave it alone for now and just try and get through the rest of the night. I think we'll get more accomplished talking to our parents later than screaming at them while the other Egyptians are around."

"Hah!" Cleo scoffed. "Maybe you can. I'm entirely sure that my father sees me and Nefera as nothing more than business partners. You know he took the title of heir away from Nefera because of her failed modeling career, and gave it back to me?"

"Wait, what do you mean back to you?"

Cleo rolled her eyes. "The heir is the first born boy in the line of children. And then father's little boy figured out that she was a girl. He was so mad that he gave the title to Nefera, but I guess over time she disappointed him even more than I did. So now she's held that against me and made my life hell for it, and I'm the one being betrothed to you instead of her, since it's more useful to pair off the heir than the spare."

Seth nodded. "Ah, I see now."

Cleo was glad she didn't have to elaborate further like she usually did. "If my mother were here, maybe she could help me convince him, but otherwise, there's no budging him." She held her head in her hands.

"My mom listens to me if I say the right things in the right way. If I convince her, then it's off."

Cleo finally stood up. Her jewelry felt ten times heavier than it had earlier. "If you think it's worth a shot, I suppose."

Seth offered his arm. "I absolutely do. You ready?"

"Not really, but I haven't really got a choice, do I? But I'm not going back in there on your arm. The gesture's appreciated, but I don't want them getting any ideas."

"You're right." He put his hands behind his back and opened the door for her. "Let's go."

Cleo stepped through the door, Seth close behind her. As they walked, she asked him to check her makeup; she was going to have to go the rest of the night acting like nothing was wrong, and smudged kohl was no way to do that.

She found herself thinking that she didn't exactly hate the prince of Boo York now. There was a lot more sympathy in her heart for him after that conversation. She wondered why they had never talked like that before; they were close in age, after all.

Glancing at her phone, Cleo saw it was nine o'clock now. Just a few more hours left.


End file.
